WANDERING through the cavernous recesses of Dun Subbin en route to the wine cellar the other day, I was suddenly struck by the following thought.

If I were a moderately ambitious politician willing to gamble on headline-winning campaign to secure electoral success, on what particular area of high ground would I raise my standard?

Asylum? No. The temperature is already sending the mercury into orbit. Hunting? Nein. You either feel one way or the other, and those who are ambivalent are now bored out of their skulls by the entire issue.

What about top-up fees? No, again. Both the main parties support charging for higher education... tricky territory, best not to lift that stone. Too grubby by far.

Health? Sorry, that's a negative too. It's common knowledge that both the major players think the NHS is a dodo that won't quite die.

So how about something nice and local, an issue peculiar to Worcester, and one that is already becoming a party-political issue? How about really cranking up the football stadium tussle?

Suspend belief for just a moment, dear reader. And Liddington - pay attention at the back.

Now. Regard the chiselled visage of that handsome beast at the top of this page and superimpose the face of Michael Foster, honourable member for the city of Worcester.

All right, he's better looking than I am. But I bet he can't blow the old gob iron like I do.

Sorry. I digress. So - I am a virtual Mike Foster and have made a number of calculations regarding the political field of battle here in The Faithful City.

The target is a Tory-run council that has proceeded cautiously over the last year or so, giving a tweak here and a tweak there... nothing too much, mind. They are Conservatives, remember.

And Worcester is much cleaner these days. The old Labour if-it's-green-concrete-over-it era is nothing but folk memory now. The Ballad Of Grove Farm has slipped way down the charts. The Tories appear impregnable.

But are they? What if there was a small breach in the True Blue Redoubt that could, with some sustained Labour artillery fire, become a yawning gap, ready to be stormed by the Arboretum Regiment of Foote?

Aha. I sense you are ahead of me now. Remember, I am Mike Foster. Permit me to trespass, if I may, dear reader, on just a few more moments of your time.

Already, I have challenged the Government Inspector's objections to the vast enabling development that includes a B&Q superstore. Not so much dissent, this has a whiff of outright rebellion...

The scene is a trench somewhere near St George's Lane. It's zero hour - time for the infantry's first attack at dawn on Friday, April 9.

Captain "Laughing Cavalier" Adrian Gregson leads the assault on Page 5 of the Evening News. He gives his full backing to Worcester City Football Club's bid, claiming that elements of the Inspector's report were flawed and the council should maintain its whole-hearted backing.

Cry God and St George's Lane for England!

At the same time, Field Marshal David Hallmark, the commanding officer leading the main body of troops, explains why relocation to a greenfield site on the edge of Worcester is crucial to the future of the football club.

The headline reads: "Why Worcester needs a new DIY superstore." Quite. It is common knowledge that this city suffers from store deprivation.

But all campaigns suffer setbacks, and on Wednesday last week, our front page story, headlined "Stadium dream impossible" reports how the club has been told to stop pursuing its impossible dream of building a giant superstore to help pay for a new stadium.

The blow is delivered when senior city councillors endorse the objections of the Government inspector. Councillor Martin Clarke, cabinet member for economic development is reported as saying:

"We want the project to happen, but the club needs to answer the questions posed and go for an achievable dream, not an impossible dream."

Enter yours truly - as Mike Foster. No one notices that Mike's lost a lot of hair lately and has an eye that looks slightly sideways. I address my loyal New Labour foot soldiers.

"My bold caballeros," say I, in my best Henry V before Agincourt. "Here is the plan for battle. New Labour will fight the local elections on a "gissa-new stadium at Nunnery" ticket.

"We will portray the Tories as being a bunch of namby-pamby tree huggers who want to deny Worcester's scores of city fans their destiny on that field of dreams by the M5.

"For good measure, we'll hint that the Tories are probably a bunch of nancy boys who don't like their hair pulled.

"There are residents - terrorists, actually - who will want to stop progress. They live in the Spetchley Road area and have already shamelessly displayed their sedition in the letters columns of the Evening News.

"But our cavalry will scatter them like the winds of autumn that lift the chaff from the floor of the harvest home.

"In addition, I will have a word in the shell-like of my good friend John 'Cement Mixer' Prescott at the Ministry of Concrete and get him to overrule the Inspector. The battle will then roll backwards and forwards right up until the next General Election.

"And that's as it should be, for we're looking at the end-game here - the result of which will be as follows.

"Worcester will revert to Labour rule. I will be re-elected MP. The city will be given its stadium. And that B&Q thingy will be visible from space, a monument to our great victory."

I should, perhaps, now confess to those of you with a nervous disposition.

I'm not really Mike Foster, and I've made this whole thing up. It is not based on anything I've heard, there are no Phillpott operatives working undercover in the Art House Cafe, the Arbo or Ye Olde Talbot, and I have no narks at the Ministry of Concrete.

Neither am I a confidant of the Worcester MP, although he did once walk past the Dun Subbin deer park on his way to see his sister-in-law. I was the one with the stetson, Mike.

No, this File is a fabrication. Maybe it came to me in a dream. Too much red wine and cheese footballs late at night. My mother always chided me for nocturnal nibbling.

But... you just never know. What if this vision of the future does indeed come to pass? Suffice to say, the stadium bid will be discussed by Worcester City Council next Tuesday and the public given the chance to make observations into June.

So it's a case of watch this space. Nunnery Way space, to be precise.